MORTECH 2000 provides technology prospectus and retrospectivemortgagepress.comMORTECH 2000, technology survey, lender Web sites
"The discrepancy between what technology providers and the
financial media are pushing and covering, and what mortgage lenders
actually want, is widening," says MORTECH founder and chief
analyst, Jeff Lebowitz.
According to Mr. Lebowitz, the MORTECH 2000 sampling indicates
that a majority of the 358 mortgage lender survey participants in
the study are currently "unprepared" for many of the new
technologies and services most widely covered by the mortgage
industry news media, including contract loan processing and risk
management services, wireless Internet access, automated valuation
models, and Extensible Markup Language (XML). By contrast, 81
percent of the MORTECH mortgage lender participants have not only
embraced automated underwriting standards, but also use it.
The MORTECH 2000 survey team focused on the opinions of the
"heads of residential mortgage lending" of its participants. The
survey reveals that 70 percent of the respondents had no knowledge
of what XML is. However, 60 percent of lenders now have a Web site
in place, and loans originated from the Internet are doubling every
year.
"Lenders are taking the inherent power of the Internet
seriously," says Mr. Lebowitz. "There has been a 30 percent
increase in the number of Web sites put up by MORTECH survey
respondents in the past year. Lenders of all sizes now are
implementing Web sites, not just the industry giants. While lenders
are investing in their proprietary Web sites, their interest in and
use of multi-lender origination networks has all but dried up."
According to the MORTECH 2000 survey, the average expenditure on
Internet technology has increased 70 percent from 1999 to 2000 to
just over $500,000. Web site functionality has deepened, moving far
beyond "brochureware" publishing.
"We are seeing growth in the breadth and depth in lenders' use
of Internet technology," continues Mr. Lebowitz. "Until now,
lenders have had static Web capabilities, posting only company and
product information on their sites. In just one year, the number of
transactional sites (having at least the ability to prequalify
borrowers) increased 60 percent to nearly 600."
Mortgage lenders are using the Internet more fully, even as they
expand their branch distribution networks. Lenders view their
branches as the primary way to increase loan production. At the
same time that they are building branches, loans closed from
applications originating on a Web site doubled last year to an
estimated $65 billion.
"Lenders are very conservative in their expectations from new
technology," Mr. Lebowitz observes. "We are seeing very low
adoption rates of technology innovations such as XML, wireless and
electronic mortgage trading exchanges. Use of leading-edge
technology is following the same measured pattern we found in the
way lenders are implementing the Internet."
The MORTECH 2000 survey is based on 358 interviews of senior
mortgage company managers completed between December 2000 and
February 2001. The survey is designed to provide data that
statistically represents the attitudes and behavior of lender
segments of all sizes.
For more information, visit www.mortech-llc.com.
